HOHENFELS, Germany – Overseas operations are familiar ground for the soldiers of the 40th Infantry Division. Born in 1917 in response to World War I, the California Army National Guard’s “Fighting Fortieth” has since waged war on the soils of Asia, Europe, and the Middle East.

Such regular deployments require international preparedness, which is why more than 60 soldiers from the Los Angeles-area Division headquarters deployed Sep. 25 to Hohenfels, Germany, to participate in Allied Spirit V. The U.S. Army Europe three-week combat exercise includes more than 2,500 participants from 8 NATO nations, including 1,455 U.S. active duty soldiers, airmen, sailors, and Army National Guard personnel from California, Louisiana, and Pennsylvania.

“This brings all the different countries from the Baltic region, the Estonians, the Latvians, the Lithuanians… together in one spot to rehearse the NATO concepts and NATO procedures so we can work together in case there was an incident,” said Lt. Col. Zac Delwiche, chief operations officer for the Division. “The exercise is very real; there's all the systems in place to provide us what a battlefield operating environment would look like. This gives us that direct action training that the Division staffs need.”

Central to Allied Spirit is the EUCOM concept of a geographically split command, in which senior units deploy a smaller headquarters element to the site of conflict to mirror the larger command element that remains at home.

“This is a concept we're testing ... of concurrent home-station mission command based on FORSCOM commander guidance,” Delwiche said, who directs Allied Spirit operations for the Division’s Germany-based element. “There's a lot of electronic, internet and IT resources that have to be synched together in order to communicate half a world away.”

The Division serves as the Higher Control, or HICON, to two Lithuanian combat arms brigades during Allied Spirit V. Like the Division, Lithuania split its command elements, deploying its Iron Wolf Brigade to Germany while its Griffin Brigade remained in the capital city of Vilnius.

“This is the first time Iron Wolf Brigade is getting to train with such a huge amount of combat elements. It's unusual for them to have an aviation force under their program,” said Major Vitalius Anisimenko, a senior training officer with the Lithuanian armed forces. “They participated in Allied Spirit in 2014, but this is a step forward and brings a lot of realism.”

Allied Spirit is largely a brigade-centered exercise. Each iteration has featured a different NATO nation as the brigade element, requiring it conduct complex, multi-national land combat operations and exercise secure communication across NATO channels. Effective combat arms units must be able to move, shoot, and communicate, and the language and protocol obstacles between the nations add another element to the already difficult war fighting task.

“There was initially a period of adjustment because we needed to learn our roles and what was expected of us. The more we work with our counterparts from Lithuania and from other countries, the better we’ll understand each other and be able to cooperate in future operations,” said Capt. Will Marquez, information operations officer for the Division. “Military language has a way of cutting through cultural barriers.”

In addition to building familiarity and cooperation between U.S. and European NATO partners, Allied Spirit V is serving to strengthen operational proficiency for the Division. In addition to the headquarters, several of the Division's subordinate units are anticipating overseas deployments over the next couple years. The exercise provides the realism that extends beyond the battlefield and reaches across the Division staff.

"You kind of feel like you have to step in and make yourself available as a team member, to puff your chest out and say 'This is my lane' and assist the commander," said 1st Lt. Frank Bittar, Division legal officer. "The learning curve has been high, but that's why I came here, and I hope to be able to use the skills I'm learning in a deployed environment.”